


Silence Is Full Of Answers

by FaunaProductions



Category: Love Never Dies - Lloyd Webber, Phantom of the Opera - Lloyd Webber
Genre: Internalized Homophobia, Multi, bi meg giry, erik and meg are married, identity exploration, set between poto and lnd, supportive husband erik
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-21 14:00:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30022830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FaunaProductions/pseuds/FaunaProductions
Summary: Meg Giry is content with her life. She's a star on the stage, a happily married woman, she has everything she's ever dreamt of.Perhaps that's why she's starting to think about some things in her past.Or, more specifically, thinking too much about the relationship she had with her best friend, Christine Daaé.
Relationships: Christine Daaé/Meg Giry (past), Erik | Phantom of the Opera/Meg Giry
Kudos: 6





	Silence Is Full Of Answers

There are some things that simply are not done, things that are not proper, things that shouldn't even be thought of.

Sometimes these unspeakable things will fit themselves neatly into a tiny crack, and when one is searching for a treasured memory, they stumble across these things instead.

Meg tries not to think of France, because  _ France _ becomes  _ Paris _ , and  _ Paris _ becomes  _ the Opera Populaire _ , and  _ the Opera Populaire _ becomes  _ the ballerinas _ , and  _ the ballerinas _ becomes  _ a ballerina _ in particular, and the thought of  _ Christine _ makes Meg's heart ache for all the wrong reasons.

She doesn't want to put a name to these reasons, and she pushes them away because she shouldn't even be thinking about them.

But sometimes…

Sometimes she remembers the soft smile Christine always offered her, and the gentle touch of Christine's hand on her arm or cheek, and the quiet way Christine used to speak to her, during rehearsals when they were meant to be silent or late at night when they were meant to be sleeping.

On some occasions, they had shared a bed, and Meg never heard a word that was said because her own heart was beating much too loudly in her ears, and her mind was spiraling with so many things she thought her head might explode.

Now, she is laying in bed with a different body against her own, his face pressed to her neck, his steady breathing warm against her skin and a comforting sound to her ears.

She almost thinks she shouldn't be living in the past when he's right here beside her in the present. After all, she's not Little Meg in the Opera House anymore, with Christine—head in the clouds, always distracted—hanging off her arm because Maman called for a break and Christine always seems to need to  _ feel _ the people she loves, touching them makes them more  _ real _ , more  _ solid _ , and they won't leave her.

That's what Meg promised her, wasn't it? She can still see Christine, eyes red from crying, asking if Meg would stay with her, at least until she's calm again because right now she can't even breathe, let alone explain what made her spiral so quickly into sobbing on the floor.

"Of course." Meg gently brushes curls away from her face, and she presses her forehead to Christine's, and she ignores the way her heart speeds up to instead add, "I would never leave you, not  _ ever _ , you hear me, Christine?"

And Christine laughs, and that's when Meg knows she really is a goner, because she only wants to hear that sound again and again.

And that night, as Meg is laying in bed, perhaps she thinks about how close their faces had been, perhaps she wonders what Christine might have done had she closed that tiny space between them, perhaps she wonders if Christine might have wrapped her arms around Meg, returning the kiss in earnest.

It was never an accident. Nothing Meg did to have a small moment with Christine was ever luck or fate.

_ I knew exactly what I wanted and I knew what I was doing when I put myself between Christine and her dressing room door _ , Meg thinks, as she stares up at the ceiling.  _ She had to brush fully past me as she left, and sometimes the entire length of her torso would press mine and I'd shiver. _

The man beside her shifts, and she knows he's awake because he inhales deeply and presses a kiss to her collarbone before tucking his head under her chin again.

Her hand gently brushes over his cheek, and he hums contentedly against her skin, and she feels guilt boiling up inside her.

She can admit her feelings to herself— _ finally _ , so many years later—but she loves him now, and she can't bring herself to admit anything to him yet.

"Did you sleep at all?" she asks softly, her hand trailing over his shoulder.

"I was too busy listening to the sound of your heart," he mutters with a soft sigh. "Music to my ears, beloved."

"It beats only for you, dearest," she says, chuckling as she presses a kiss to the top of his head.

Is she lying to him, in that it's only for him? Does it also beat for Christine? Years later, would she take that woman's face into her hands, and kiss her until she either pushed away or kissed back? Would she consider it, consequences be damned? Could she do that to Erik?

_ Now isn't the time nor the place _ , she decides, adjusting slightly to hold him closer to herself,  _ All I know for sure is that I have loved two people in my life, and one of them is in my arms _ .

She doesn't think she could hurt him like that, but then again, she can't know for sure.

After all, it's been so long since she's seen Christine, and even longer since she acknowledged the possibility of wanting anything more than the friendship she was so freely given.

If given the chance now, who's to say what she would do?

Erik leaves before the sun has even risen, and Meg finds herself down at the beach at dawn. She thinks perhaps she can shoo those thoughts from her mind, or maybe just see them clearly without that cloud of guilt obscuring them.

She purses her lips, unfastening the strap of her shoe and looking up. No one is here. Even the gulls are sleepy.

Out loud, barely above a whisper but  _ spoken out loud _ , "Most of the time, her ribbons were fine and really, I should have just told her so, but some days…"

She chews on her bottom lip, staring across the vast ocean. "Some days, she was glowing, radiant, she was a cathedral window with the sun streaming in, and- and any excuse to touch her was worth a little lie."

She feels like she is talking about something forbidden, and she supposes she is, but that is between her and the fish she tells her story to. "'Are your ribbons loose? Let me see the stitches,' I would say, and her hand on my shoulder and her breath so near my hair as I knelt at her ankles to make a pretense of adjusting the ribbons of her pointe shoes were things I cannot ever forget. I remember to this day."

Her swim does not clear her mind.

"She was always so kind," she says aloud, lazily drifting through the water. "She would often brush and style my hair for me, she knew I was more than capable of doing it myself but she simply… enjoyed doing it."

She lets out a long, soft sigh. "Oh, how I loved the feeling of her fingers gently working their way through my hair."

She searches the sky for answers among the clouds to so many questions that have gone unspoken for so long. "How did Christine feel about me, about our moments together? How does she feel now?"

Her gaze drifts, looking for shapes in the clouds. "Does she even think of me? Does she wonder about my health, as I so often find myself wondering about hers?"

Her feet find the sand beneath the water and her hands slowly circle in front of herself to grab her arms. "If we are reunited, will she wrap her arms around me in an embrace? Will she be overjoyed at the sight of me, as I will be at the sight of her?"

She isn't sure when tears began to fall, but they mingle with the ocean and she takes a deep breath. "I'm not a foolish little girl anymore, I shouldn't cry over such things."

Still, she stays where she is for a while longer, until her cheeks are damp and her eyes perhaps a bit too red around the edges.

"I miss her," is the final secret she whispers to the fish in the water.

"I love her," does not quite leave her lips.

Meg loves Erik very much. That does not mean he is not absolutely infuriating on occasion—perhaps quite often, even.

Her mind is full—a box with too many items all packed inside, determined to fit just one more thing—with beads and buttons and gems and fabrics to match and  _ fox skulls _ ?

_ Erik, really. _ She thinks with a roll of her eyes.  _ How am I to find two dozen fox skulls for these costumes? Your routine is hardly half-finished, anyway! _

He should do his own shopping for trims: four widths of ribbon, five shades of fox-colors of silk ranging from flame orange to cinnamon and through an intense auburn that is the exact color of Christine’s hair, so that is what Meg writes down on her list.

She starts a little and looks at her own note. She’s never been one to keep a diary, she never saw the use of it, but it’s making a bit of sense now—writing things down makes them more solid somehow. A more permanent thing than fleeting thoughts swept away by her husband’s breath against her skin or spoken words carried away by the waves.

To the list she adds,  _ I miss her so much _ . No matter how many buttons and ribbons she finds, not even the perfect one will solve that problem.

_ I never kissed her and I wish I had _ . It's true, and it makes all of this so much harder—if it's true, she has to remind herself that it didn't happen because it wasn't  _ meant _ to happen, because it was  _ improper _ , because they were  _ friends _ and that's all they were  _ supposed _ to be, all they  _ could _ be, and—

She's destroyed the page; sketch and notes and list, torn to shreds.

_ It's fitting _ , she thinks, as she carefully collects the bits and pieces.  _ The state of my heart is no different _ .

She feels it isn't fair to Erik for her to think such things, and she really, truly,  _ deeply _ loves him, and it  _ isn't _ fair because sometimes  _ life _ isn't fair and humans are these jumbled creations, notes of their perfections listed in a little book while their flaws tear the pages at the corners and edges.

Erik struggles because he is not human enough. Meg struggles because she is _ too _ human.

She feels too much and her heart is porcelain.

He feels too little and his heart is stone.

The world is not kind enough to broken people. To the people like Meg, who are so easily shattered when you only stumble and they slip from your fingers, or to people like Erik whose cracks go deep from being thrown to the ground, no care shown for the little rocks.

She throws the destroyed page away.

Erik has to redo the sketch—and he can, so easily, it's uncanny. Perhaps she can convince him to leave off the fox skulls. Perhaps he'll tell her what kissing Christine was like.

Foolish thoughts that nevertheless try to leave her lips.

She does not allow them to break free.

He redraws the fox and doesn't ask why. He does instead ask a dozen more questions than he normally might about buttons and ribbons.

She answers the silent question thinly veiled behind his incessant queries, "I'm fine," she says, a relative term, really, and she's  _ fine _ according to her own definition, but she doesn't hesitate or stumble as she adds, "Someday, there is something I will ask you, but not today."

He nods, never one to pry into his wife's life as she does not pry into his, and he presses a short but sweet and familiar kiss to her temple, and what he says is, "Off to the shops with you, do try to hurry back with my trims." but she can hear the remark below the surface,  _ Whatever you would like to ask, don't keep me waiting _ .

"I'll go at my own pace, Monsieur." Her tone is teasingly pointed, but her voice is soft.

"Very well," he says, and she's almost surprised when he takes her hand, pulling it up to place a gentle kiss on her knuckles. "I shall expect you when you arrive and no sooner."

Erik is a master craftsman. For each piece of Meg's porcelain heart that is broken away, he is there to carefully put it back where it should be, filling the cracks with gold.

She has found that his stone heart has a dazzling crystal hidden beneath the cold, gray exterior. Gems never sparkle how they're meant to unless they're cut and set properly. She can only hope she makes a fine enough lapidarist for it to shimmer.

She turns her thoughts from porcelain and gemstones to buttons and ribbons, and this time she keeps Christine far from her list, even as she remembers her hair, her eyes, her smile, her laugh.

Erik is quite happy to receive the most perfect trim for these costumes, and Meg is quite happy to complain about searching half the city for fox skulls, and their playful teasing fills the night air with quips and chuckles.

She won't ask tonight. She won't ask tomorrow, or next week, or next month. But she will talk to him—soon, if her heart will allow it, later, if not.

For now, there's this—her husband, his fox design, their home. And she is content with that.

It does not come up for a long time.

There are so many days where she ponders how to word it, and when she sees him next, her question is nearly voiced.

She still can't bring herself to ask it.

The words become "How did you like the routine?" or "Any updates on that new song?" or even just a simple "I love you."

She knows he's getting impatient, not that he's said anything to that effect, but he watches her with the kind of eye she knows means he's trying to find the perfect piece to click into the puzzle that is… Meg Giry.

She sometimes wonders if he sees  _ her _ or just sees some sort of anomaly he wants to figure out.

He built a safe haven for outcasts, weirdos, and anomalies—she just happens to be the one he married.

In their conversations, at home and at work, she can hear his unspoken inquiries of  _ Are you ready? _ and  _ Is everything alright? _ and  _ I'm here _ and  _ I'm waiting _ .

She spends the day turning the question over in her head, mentally marking out the worst of them, reworking it again, just trying to find the words.

They're laying in bed now, she's laying on his chest and she's pretty sure he's just starting to doze off, but she's found the words and she has just enough courage to open her mouth to voice them, "What was kissing Christine like?"

It's simple. No more and no less than what she wants to know.

Erik stops breathing, but she doesn't try to back down, she hardly ever does.

He's silent for a long moment but his voice is surprisingly level when he asks a question in return, "Why do you ask?"

She knows him well enough by now, she can guess how he will react to most anything she can say.

Despite this, she has trouble answering him.

"Just tell me?" she says instead, sitting up to look at him properly. "Please?"

He lays there, staring at her for a moment, before he sits up, taking her hand into his own.

"It was different from kissing you," he says, his thumb running over her knuckles. "It was… It wasn't out of love. She kissed me to- she wanted me to know I don't have to hide if I have someone who  _ cares _ about me." He pauses, his other hand moving to Meg's cheek. "Your kisses are so full of love, they show devotion and care and so many things I don't have words to describe. Her kiss was… It was pity, I think, more than anything else, but… Also compassion. Something human, something I'd never experienced before."

Meg nods hesitantly, and she isn't sure what has her saying anything other than thanking him, but the words that actually slip out are "I loved her."

His eyes widen but he's silent. Somehow it's both more and less than what she expected from him.

"You could at least say something," she mutters, pulling away from his touch.

"Oh, I didn't…" he trails off, his hands resting on his lap. "I thought- I thought a, um, non-reaction might be… better?"

"I cannot stress to you how wrong you are," she says, shaking her head. "I'm- I'm sorry-"

"No," he interrupts her quickly, reaching forward to grab her wrists. "No, no, don't- there's no reason-" He lets go. "Okay, let's try again… You love Christine, you- you love a woman? In the same way you love me?"

"I do- I  _ did _ -" she huffs, rubbing her eyes. "I don't  _ know _ , but- I have only ever  _ loved _ two people, Erik." She places her hand on his leg. "I'm looking at one of them. The other was my best friend."

She inhales deeply, and he allows her to take a moment to collect her thoughts.

"I never kissed her," she says finally, "It… It was improper to do so, or even to think about it… But I wanted it, I wanted to try, just- just to know how she- if she might feel the same."

"I understand," he says, taking her hands into his own. "Christine… She was something I wanted, but never deserved, something I knew I shouldn't have—I know it's… It's not quite the same kind of improper that you're trying to put words around, but I rather think that she would have chosen your kisses over the madman behind the mirror."

"That is the worst compliment I have ever received," she says with a soft laugh. "I love you so much." She presses a quick kiss to his lips. "Usually."

"I love you too," he says, a small smile on his face.

"I can't sleep now," she says, pulling herself out of bed. "I'm going to make tea. Care to join me?"

They stay up, drinking tea and reminiscing, avoiding the memories that hurt and sharing the stories that don't.

Meg's heart feels lighter, no longer burdened by her secret, and she's happier now than she has been in months.


End file.
